| Abstract: | Since 1949, Taiwan and Mainland China have been living in an atmosphere of political hostility, hostility that has reached its pick under President Chen Shui-bian Administration but been mitigated under the current leadership of President Ma Ying-jeou, who, instead of focusing on political independence, is strategically moving toward securing Taiwan's economic survival. So the deteriorating political relations originally based on a 'Taiwanese exceptionalism' with a strong desire for the Island's independence is gradually giving place to a growing economic interdependence that may give rise to new concerns defined in terms of the strategic implications of such economic convergence between Mainland China and Taiwan with a particular emphasis on Taiwan's political survival. The purpose of the present proposed research is to spell out the existing contradiction or dilemma in the cross-strait political and economic spheres. For a better operationalization, the present research paper, based upon a nomothetic causality perspective, will first and foremost try to figure out the most important factors that play in favor of the a cross-strait economic dynamism. Then it will try to identify the strategic implications of such economic interdependence on the future of cross-strait relations with an emphasis on the security matters relating to Taiwan's political survival. Reaching out a meaningful approach of these obvious dichotomies nourished over the years by a political impasse (political coercion) and economic dynamism (economic cooptation) requires necessary a theoretical framework, and so, to explore, describe, explain, and possibly predict future outcome of cross-strait relations. |
